Rerouted
by GrandCommander13
Summary: After an early morning tower recon, Ulrich, Odd, and Yumi disappear during devirtualization. Jeremie has to go into Lyoko to find them while Aelita evades XANA's clones and specters.
1. Chapter 1

Re-routed

Chapter One

* * *

Ulrich scanned the area in front of him. There was absolutely nothing wrong with the scene: the tower was inactive, there were no monsters, and there were no pulsations anywhere. 

"Yeah Jeremie, I'm sure," he said.

Back in the lab, Jeremie placed his hand to his chin and thought. XANA wasn't in the habit of activating towers just for kicks.

"Alright then," Jeremie replied. He learned forward in his chair and started accessing the network traffic histories in the supercomputer's logs. "I'll see if XANA was accessing anything. Wait for just a minute and I'll de-virtualize you." The logs came up on the screen, and Jeremie spoke to Aelita over the communicator. "It's alright Aelita, you can come back upstairs; XANA deactivated the tower."

"Okay."

Glancing at the logs quickly, Jeremie didn't see anything interesting. No data had been sent out or received by the supercomputer in the past day, at least. The elevator came up, and Aelita stepped out of it and yawned.

"Wow, it's six in the morning already. I don't know if I'll be able to get back to sleep before it's time for class."

Jeremie smiled. "Maybe this is XANA's way of telling Odd he should be studying for his math test instead of sleeping."

"Hey Einstein, I heard that. I'll have you know I actually _did_ study."

"Oh really?" Yumi asked. "For how long."

"Five minutes. But that still counts, right?"

"Sorry to butt in guys," Jeremie interrupted. "But I'm bringing you guys back. One moment please."

With a few keystrokes, Jeremie entered the command to return everybody to the real world. It began the process normally, but their cards disappeared from the screen halfway through the operation. The flashing red exclamation error symbol popped up on the screen, along with an error message. "Cannot read data," it said. "Abort, Retry, Fail?" it prompted.

Jeremie took in a deep breath and clenched his teeth. What was it talking about?

"Guys," he said over the communicator. There was no response. "Guys, are you there? Guys? Ulrich? Yumi? Odd?" There was still no answer. He turned his head to Aelita, who was staring at the error message with a calm but fearful gaze. Still staring at the monitor, she furrowed her brow. Jeremie turned his head back to the console and saw another message had been popped up. This time, however, it wasn't an error message.

"Missing something?" it read.

Jeremie snorted. "Real cute, XANA." He shook his head, trying to clear it. He had to keep calm; he couldn't let XANA get to him. XANA _wanted_ him upset and confused. He knew he had to get his friends back, and fast. The only sensible way to go about it would be to try the easiest solution first, and work from there. He picked his head back up, and stared at the error message again. After closing XANA's popup message, he reached his hand out for the keyboard and hit the 'R' key to retry the materialization process.

As soon as he hit the key, he wished he hadn't. Aelita, who had been standing behind him trying to puzzle out the various processes XANA could have used to trap her friends, suddenly dropped to the ground and let out a terrible shriek of pain.

Even worse than the pain it put Aelita into was the nightmarish, inhuman scream that erupted forth from every speaker in the factory. Jeremie clamped his hands to his hears, trying to block out the deafening roar.

It only lasted for a second, but it was horrifying all the same. As quickly as it started, it ended. Aelita stood back up, panting to catch her breath. Jeremie took his hands off of his ears, and opened his eyes. There was another message up on the screen now. "Don't do that," was all it said. Still recovering from the shock, Jeremie had trouble closing the window with his shaky hand on the keyboard. He managed it though, and Aelita spoke.

"That… That felt like." She stopped. "That felt like I was being ripped apart, pulled in every direction at once."

Jeremie cocked an eyebrow. "No, not _pulled_ in every direction." He paused, considering what this meant. He knew exactly what it meant, but the enormity if it was another matter entirely. Aelita's eyes lit up with recognition.

"XANA crossed the data circuits. He redirected their data through himself when you executed the materialization program. Trying to read the data accessed every part of the supercomputer at once, straining the hardware."

Jeremie nodded. He got out of his chair and began walking towards the elevator. "I'm going to go fix the circuits, then we can figure out how to get everyone back."

"Don't, Jeremie." Jeremie stopped, and looked at Aelita, puzzled.

"Why not?" Jeremie looked back at the console. Right now, every second counted. Without the others, there was no way Aelita could go onto Lyoko; not without her memories being taken by the Scyphozoa anyway.

"We'll need the circuits the way they are to save the others," Aelita explained.

After pausing a moment to reflect on their problem, Jeremie realized Aelita was right. As long as the circuits were crossed, there was a direct path to wherever XANA sent the data. If the circuits were to be un-crossed early, then finding the data would be like finding a needle in a hay stack.

"_A direct path…"_ Jeremie thought. "Aelita," he said out loud.

"Yes, Jeremie?"

"I need you to operate the console. I'm going to the scanner room."

"But Jeremie," Aelita began, her concern showing plainly on her face. Even voicing her dissent, however, she realized Jeremie was right. XANA wanted Aelita on Lyoko, where the others wouldn't be around to protect her from the Scyphozoa. Jeremie was the only one of them who could go. She nodded. "Okay."

Jeremie entered the elevator, and Aelita sat down in front of the console.

"Are you ready Jeremie?" Aelita set the program to follow the circuits to wherever XANA had redirected the others.

"As ready as I'll ever be." Jeremie closed his eyes as he stepped into the scanner. He was nervous, but also resolute.

"Okay, prepare for virtualization." Aelita thought for a moment, and tapped a few more keys. "There. I'm sending you in with a copy of Ulrich's sword."

Jeremie groaned mentally. A weapon would be a good idea, but the thought of wielding one like an amateur didn't sound too enticing. However, it was still a lot better than nothing.

"Okay Aelita, it's now or never. Virtualize me and get safe. XANA's bound to come after you."

"Roger," Aelita said. She pressed Enter. "Transfer: Jeremie. Scanner: Jeremie. Virtualization."


	2. Chapter 2

Somewhere in Sector 5, Jeremie was virtualized. He glanced around, trying to get a feel for where he was. He quickly realized that he was about ten feet above the ground and was falling! This observation came too late, however, and he fell onto his butt.

Picking himself up and looking around for a second time, he saw that he wasn't in the arena where the group usually started in Sector 5. He was in some sort of long hallway with a large ledge at the far end. The walls to either side of him weren't flat, however. Large pieces of varying height, thickness, and width – each large enough to hide a Creeper behind, however – stuck out of the walls, making it impossible to know if he was alone in the hall.

He heard a sound ahead. Nervously, Jeremie drew the sword, and held it in both hands. He stepped forward slowly, not wanting to alert the monster. He looked to his left and didn't see anything, but was surprised by a sudden roar from his right. Turning his body and raising his sword at the same time, Jeremie managed to block the first shot from the Creeper. Gritting his teeth, Jeremie stepped forward and slashed clumsily at the monster. He hit the Creeper in the center of its torso with a glancing blow. The weak hit seemed good enough to do the job, however, as the Creeper first reverted to a wire frame, then disappeared.

Jeremie stepped forward, his sword raised and ready to strike again. He heard more roars further down the hallway, and his vision darted from side to side trying to discern what direction the next monster would come from. After he calmed down and allowed his body to relax, he noticed that he could see the Creepers, even through all of the obstacles in between him and them. There were three more in the hallway. One was stalking towards him, and the other two were waiting in ambush.

"_When did I get this power?_" Jeremie wondered. He shook his head. There was no time to sit around pondering this. Every second he stood here idly was another second XANA had to capture Aelita and virtualize her onto Lyoko so her memories could be stolen. Quickly but quietly, Jeremie stalked forward through the maze-like hall to get rid of the rest of the Creepers, then see what was up on that ledge.

------

Aelita climbed up the ladder, removed the manhole, and peered at her surroundings. Everything looked safe topside. Before climbing out, she looked back down once more; she couldn't shake the feeling that she was being followed. It didn't matter though; anywhere was safer than sitting still in one place.

She quietly replaced the manhole cover and listened. There was no noise at all. Hardly able to breathe, she stood up and begin creeping toward the school; she could access Jeremie's computer and try to talk to him once she got there. Quickening her pace a bit and breathing more, she reflected on their situation. XANA clearly hadn't deleted the others yet, so why would he keep their data intact? The kind of access he could gain by properly data mining them would…

Aelita was torn from her thoughts by the sound of metal on metal: exactly like a manhole cover being removed. She broke into a run, sprinted through the school's unlocked door and moved as quickly as she could for Jeremie's room.

------

After clearing his way past the Creepers, Jeremie pulled himself up onto the ledge. He couldn't see anything, but he could _feel_ quite a lot. Closing his eyes and concentrating, Jeremie felt as though all the data in Lyoko was being routed through a central point very close to where he was, perhaps fifty paces forward. Opening his eyes once more, he saw a wall perhaps twenty paces ahead.

Jeremie looked to the left again, then to the right. There were no monsters nearby, so he sheathed his sword, then started moving. He walked until he was close enough to the wall to touch it, then stopped. He placed his hand against the wall and felt that it was permeable, just like how a tower's wall could be walked through by Aelita and his friends.

He pushed his way through the wall and immediately found what he was looking for. In the center of the room was a roughly baseball-sized sphere of black, and arranged around it were three red energy fields – basically red Guardians – each containing one of his friends. Ulrich, Odd, and Yumi must have been snatched up by these modified Guardians as soon as they were virtualized into the labyrinth outside. At the moment, the black sphere was just sitting there inert, passively being fed data.

"_Jeremie,_" Jeremie heard Aelita's voice in his head. "_Jeremie, are you there?_"

"Yeah, I'm here Aelita. Are you safe?" As soon as he said that, Jeremie noticed that the black sphere surged with activity. It began sending data and receiving even more than it had been already, and what looked like black veins pulsed on its now rotating surface.

"_For now. I think I'm being followed though. Have you found them yet?_"

"I just found them, but they're trapped by Guardians."

"_Oh no_," Aelita said, worried.

"There's a way to get them out though. Go to Ulrich's room, and look in the drawer under his bed. There should be a CD that will auto-run the Guardian defeating program. Insert it into my computer and it should be able to handle the rest on its own."

"_Okay Jeremie, but… I don't think XANA's minions are far behind._"

"Be careful, Aelita."

"_I will._"


	3. Chapter 3

After closing down the connection, Aelita crept over to the door and peered into the empty hall. Seeing that it was still safe, she stepped out into the hall and walked as quietly as she could into Ulrich's room. She opened the door, and cringed as it creaked, but she couldn't delay. She hurried into the room to get the disc that could free her friends.

Aelita's attention suddenly shot from Ulrich's drawer to Ulrich's mattress. Sitting calmly on the bed was Ulrich.

"What took you so long?" he asked. His voice sounded perfectly normal, though the tone was patronizing and a bit bored. Hearing the voice brought Aelita back to her senses.

"XANA," she said, taking a step back.

"Well," the Ulrich clone said. "I never accused you of being stupid." It stood up and took a step towards Aelita. Aelita took another step back. "Wanna see something really cool I just learned how to do?" it asked.

Without waiting for an answer, its skin started to bend and flex, and there was a faint green glow at every place that the skin tugged against itself. It closed its eyes and gritted its teeth, and it slowly grew another foot taller. It opened its eyes and the eye of XANA was plainly visible. The face then aged rapidly, until the copy of Ulrich standing in front of Aelita appeared to be almost thirty. It then looked down at its clothes, disapproving of the way they were now far too tight for the new, larger body. A green line appeared at the collar of the shirt and rapidly moved down all the way to the bottom of the shoes; as the line passed over the fabric and other materials, the clothing changed and became larger.

"I'd say my work was already paying off, wouldn't you?" it asked in a new, deeper voice. Satisfied with its stronger body, the clone lunged at Aelita. Aelita screamed and dodged to the side, then herself lunged for the drawer. She threw it open and tore through the items inside it, quickly finding the disc. With the disc firmly in her hand, Aelita lifted her head to look forward and prepared to stand, but quickly found her throat in the clone's hands and felt herself being lifted off the ground.

Freeing herself with a kick to the clone's stomach, Aelita screamed again and ran out the door, dashing wildly for Jeremie's room with the clone not far behind her.

* * *

In the center room, Jeremie paced. Something wasn't right; Aelita was taking too long, and that black sphere was frantic with activity, and had even seemed to develop a dull sheen. Jeremie stopped pacing, and looked at the sphere again. Thoughtfully, he unsheathed his sword and stepped towards it. If it really was a representation of… 

Jeremie's thoughts were cut off by a surge of network activity on Lyoko. As soon as the transmission ended, a tiny white orb forced its way out of the black sphere, despite much resistance It floated up to the exact center of the room, which was about ten feet above the black sphere, and hovered there. Jeremie could feel it analyzing the room.

The white orb hummed with activity. Its analysis complete, it split into three identical orbs, and they each floated down in front of a different guardian, hovering about two feet in front of it.

Jeremie smiled. The program was working, and hopefully he could find a way out of there as soon as his friends were freed. Still, he was also worried. Why hadn't Aelita contacted him? He resolved to keep his mind on helping his friends, but he couldn't help but worry about her.

The orbs started flying in circles. The circles slowly enlarged, then turned into ovals as the orbs flew faster and faster. Then with a flash of white light, the orbs were gone, replaced with perfect images of Ulrich, Odd, and Yumi.

Seeing these new targets, the red guardians reached out tendrils towards the images. The tendrils poked and prodded at the images, but did not absorb them.

Something had gone wrong. Frustrated, Jeremie clenched his fist and closed his eyes. How could-

With his eyes closed though, he could feel it. In his mind he could see the room perfectly. His friends, inside the guardians being thoroughly scanned and the information fed to the black sphere; the guardians encasing them, their coding oddly different from the coding of the normal guardians that Jeremie was somehow able to recall; and the black sphere in the center, seething with activity and throwing up numerous firewalls to conceal and encase access to its coding.

The coding… Jeremie wondered. Opening his eyes, he looked at the guardian encasing Yumi. Aware of it now, Jeremie mentally dug into Lyoko's code structure and reached towards the line of code responsible for this guardian's existence, destroying it with a thought.

The effect as instantaneous. It was like holding a water bottle upside down and unscrewing the cap: one piece was removed and the rest of the code disintegrated. The guardian vanished, leaving Yumi standing in a daze.

Holding her hand to her head, she asked "ugh, what happened?" She turned to her left and saw Jeremie standing there. "Jeremie? Is that-" She then looked around and saw the rest of the room. "What is going on here?" she asked, bewildered.

"No time to explain," Jeremie said hurriedly. Without any time to waste, Jeremie mentally reached out and deleted the other two guardians.

Odd looked around and quickly took stock of the situation. "I'm figuring we _weren't_ supposed to show up here," he observed.

Also confused, Ulrich looked around the room and saw Jeremie, and was somewhat surprised to see him on Lyoko. "Jeremie, what happened? Where are we? How did you get here?"

"I don't know where we are," Jeremie replied. "But I know that we need to get out of here. Come on, we can push through that wall," he said, pointing towards another permeable wall on the opposite end of the room. He didn't know where it led, but he knew that the wall he came in from led to a dead end.

Yumi pulled out her fans and opened them, ready to strike anything that got in their way. "Fine by me, let's go!" She started running towards the wall.

"Yeah," Odd and Ulrich said in unison, readying their weapons as well. They began running after Yumi.

Getting ready to follow, Jeremie looked at the sphere again. It was strangely calm now, with only a single vein worming its way across the surface. Jeremie shook his head. He didn't have time to deal with it; he had to get himself and the others out of there. Breaking into a run, he moved towards his friends who had almost reached the wall.

Without warning Jeremie felt another pulse of data from the sphere, a strange pulse he had never felt before but felt familiar all the same. He didn't have any time to think, he just reacted. A translucent green wall sprang up behind his friends. The pulse impacted it and dissipated into a puff of steam.

Jeremie turned around to see the surface of the black sphere boiling with activity. He drew his sword again and held it at ready, but then he felt the voiceless words in his head.

_You were always too skilled with computers for your own good. I have often spent time wondering why you refuse to leave well enough alone, refuse to submit, refuse to save yourself, but it is of no consequence to me. You may be strong enough to save your friends, but protecting them means you now lack the strength to save yourself._

Jeremie glanced back at the others. They were pounding against the wall, and their mouths were moving but he could not hear them. He turned back to the sphere just in time to dodge a black tendril shooting from the sphere towards him. Rushing forward and to the left, Jeremie dove towards the sphere and slashed at it with his sword.

As soon as it hit the sphere, the point of impact sizzled with energy but the attack did nothing otherwise. Confused, Jeremie tried to pull the sword back for another swing, only to find that the sword was stuck to the sphere, as if held there by a powerful magnet. Suddenly, the impact site flashed with energy again, and the sword flew from Jeremie's hands and embedded itself high up in one of the walls.

_Unfortunately for you, I have already taken the time to shield myself from attacks by your digital manifestation._

Unshaken, Jeremie leapt back, dodging another tendril from the sphere. He closed his eyes and concentrated, felt the path of data leading from him to the sphere, which he was certain was XANA. There had to be a-

There, a gap in XANA's firewall. Breathing deeply to concentrate, Jeremie moved his mind in, looking for the piece of code to snip to pull the plug on XANA for good.

Just as he sighted the correct line, a virtual wall popped up in front of it and Jeremie lost access. His attention suddenly returning to the room he was standing in, Jeremie opened his eyes just in time to see a tendril from the sphere slam into his chest. As soon as it hit him, it fused with his virtual skin, hardened, and began to lift him off of the ground. How? How had he not sensed it?

_You are bewildered, confused at how I can hide from you even with you right in front of me._

Two more tendrils shot out of the sphere. Jeremie tried to put up a shield to block them, tried to delete them, tried to do something, but it was no use. They embedded into his shoulders, and again fused and hardened.

_You should have just saved yourself. Now that I have tampered with the circuits, I have all of the computer's processing power at my disposal. On even grounds perhaps you could pose a threat to me, but now you are nothing._

Another tendril slithered out of XANA's sphere, but this one was different. Thicker than the others, it slowly snaked towards Jeremie, approaching his forehead.

_You have taught me much Jeremie. Resilience, adaptability, and tenacity. But now it is time for you to teach me more. From your mind I shall extract the data I need to finally take complete control of the computer. Your friends shall trouble me no longer, and there will be no one to continue in their place._

The tendril stopped its slow advance about a foot away from Jeremie's forehead. Jeremie could feel it eyeing him hungrily: it was searching for the most ideal point from which to begin extracting information from him. Jeremie again tried to reach out with his mind, but the tendrils already lodged within him were dampening his abilities somehow.

_With no one to protect her, the capture of Aelita will be a simple feat. I will escape this computer Jeremie, and you are powerless to stop me. I have won._


End file.
